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FATHER ABRAHAM 




I Reckon He Learned More From the Soldiers 
Than He Did From the Generals" 



FATHER ABRAHAM 



BY 
IDA M. TARBELL 

Author of " The Life of Lincoln," " The History of the 
Standard Oil Company," etc. 

With Illustrations by 
BLENDON CAMPBELL 




NEW YORK 
MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY 

1909 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Cooies Received 

APR 2 W09 

Copyri^Ht tritry 

class au ™& no. 



.7. 



Copyright, 1909, by the 
PHILLIPS PUBLISHING COMPANY 

Copyright, 1909, by 

MOFFAT, YARD AND COMPANY 

New York 

Published March, 1909 



THE QUINN 4 BODEN CO. PRESS 
RAHWAY, N. J. 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



FACING 
PAGE 



" I reckon he learned more from the soldiers 
than he did from generals " Frontispiece 

" An army that don't have its belly and 
feet taken care of ain't going to do much 
fighting " 6 

" And it's nuthin' but one big hospital, 
Billy" 14 

What am I that Thou shouldst ask this of 

me? 24 - 

" Don't mind me, Billy, the Lord generally 
knows what He's about " . .26 

" Be you Abe Lincoln? " . . . . M 



FATHER ABRAHAM 



KIND-HEARTED? Mr. Lin- 
coln kind-hearted? 
I don't believe a man ever lived 
who'd rather seen everybody happy and 
peaceable than Abraham Lincoln. He 
never could stand it to have people suf- 
ferin' or not gettin' what they wanted. 
Time and time again I've seen him go 
taggin' up street here in this town after 
some youngster that was blubberin' be- 
cause he couldn't have what wa'n't good 
for him. Seemed as if he couldn't rest 
till that child was smilin' again. You can 
go all over Springfield and talk to the 
people who was boys and girls when he 
lived here and every blamed one will tell 
you something he did for 'em. Every- 
3 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
body's friend, that's what he was. Jest 
as natural for him to be that way as 'twas 
for him to eat or drink. 

Yes, I suppose bein' like that did make 
the war harder on him. But he had horse 
sense as well as a big heart, Mr. Lincoln 
had. He knew you couldn't have war 
without somebody gettin' hurt. He ex- 
pected sufferin', but he knew 'twas his 
business not to have any more than was 
necessary and to take care of what come. 
And them was two things that wa'n't done 
like they ought to 'a' been. That was 
what worried him. 

Seemed as if hardly anybody at the 
start had any idea of how important 'twas 
to take good care of the boys and keep 'em 
from gettin' sick or if they did get sick to 
cure 'em. I remember Leonard Swett was 
in here one day 'long back in '61 and he 
says: "Billy, Mr. Lincoln knows more 
4 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
about how the soldiers in the Army of 
the Potomac cook flapjacks than you do 
about puttin' up quinine. There ain't a 
blamed thing they do in that army that he 
ain't interested in. I went down to camp 
with him one day and I never see an old 
hunter in the woods quicker to spot a rab- 
bit's track than he was every little kink 
about the houseKeepin'. When we got 
back to town he just sat and talked and 
talked about the way the soldiers was liv- 
in', seemed to know all about 'em every- 
ways: where they was short of shoes, 
where the rations were poor, where they 
had camp-fever worst ; told me how hard- 
tack was made, what a good thing quinine 
and onions are to have handy, — best cure 
for diarrhea, sore feet, homesickness, 
everything. I never heard anything like 
it." 

Seemed to bother Swett a little that 
5 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
Mr. Lincoln took so much interest in all 
them little tilings, but I said: " Don't you 
worry, Mr. Swett, Mr. Lincoln's got the 
right idee. An army that don't have its 
belly and feet taken care of ain't goin' to 
do much fightin', and Mr. Lincoln's got 
sense enough to know it. He knows diar- 
rhea's a blamed sight more dangerous to 
the Army of the Potomac than Stonewall 
Jackson. Trouble so far has been, in my 
judgment, that the people that ought to 
have been seein' to what the soldiers was 
eatin' and drinkin' and whether their beds 
was dry and their bowels movin', was 
spendin' their time polishin' their buttons 
and shinin' their boots for parade." 

" What I don't see," says Swett, " is 
how he learned all the things he knows. 
They ain't the kind of tilings you'd natu- 
rally think a president of the United 
States would be interestin' himself in." 
6 



X 







FATHER ABRAHAM 
There 'twas, — same old fool notion that 
a president ought to sit inside somewhere 
and think about the Constitution. I used 
to be that way — always saw a president 
lookin' like that old picture of Thomas 
Jefferson up there settin' beside a parlor 
table holdin' a roll of parchment in his 
hand, and Leonard Swett was like me a 
little in spite of his bein' educated. 

Learned it! Think of Leonard Swett 
askin' that with all his chances of bein' 
with Mr. Lincoln! Learned it just as he 
had everything by bein' so dead interested. 
He'd learned it if he hadn't been president 
at all, if he'd just been loafln' around 
Washington doin' nuthin'. Greatest hand 
to take notice of things. I tell you he'd 
made a great war correspondent. Things 
he'd 'a' seen! And the way he'd 'a' told 
'em! I can just see him now pumpin' 
everybody that had been to the front. 
7 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
Great man to make you talk, Mr. Lin- 
coln was. I've heard him say himself that 
most of the education he had he'd got from 
people who thought they was learnin' 
from him. 

I reckon he learned a lot more from sol- 
diers about how the armies was bein' taken 
care of than he did from generals. My 
brother Isaac, who had a place down there 
addin' up Aggers or somethin', used to tell 
me of seein' Mr. Lincoln stoppin' 'em on 
the street and out around the White 
House and talkin' to 'em. Isaac said 
'twa'n't becomin' in the President of the 
United States to be so familiar with com- 
mon soldiers, he ought to keep among the 
generals and members of the administra- 
tion. Isaac always reckoned himself a 
member of the administration. 

" More than that," says Isaac, " it ain't 
dignified for a president to be always run- 
8 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
nin' out after things himself instead of 
sendin' somebody. He's always goin' 
over to the telegraph office with messages, 
and settin' down by the operators talkin' 
and readin' dispatches and waitin' for an- 
swers. One day he came right up to my 
office to ask me to look up the record of 
Johnnie Banks, old Aunt Sally Banks' 
boy, that was goin' to be shot for desertion. 
Seemed to think I'd be interested be- 
cause he came from Illinois — came right 
up there instead of sendin' for me to go to 
the White House like he ought to, and 
when I took what I found over to him and 
he found out Johnnie wa'n't but eighteen, 
he put on his hat and went over himself 
to the telegraph office, took me along, and 
sent a message that I saw, savin', c I dont 
want anybody as young as eighteen to be 
shot! And that night he went back and 
sent another message askin' if they'd re- 
9 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
ceived the first — wasn't satisfied till he 
knew it couldn't happen. There wa'n't 
any reason why he should spend his time 
that way. He ought to give orders and 
let other folks see they're carried out. 
That's what I'd do if I was president." 

That riled me. " I reckon there ain't 
any need to worry about that, Isaac," I 
says. " You won't never be president. 
Mr. Lincoln's got too many folks around 
him now that don't do nuthin' but give 
orders. That's one reason he has to do 
his own executin'." 

But 'twas just like him to go and do it 
himself. So interested he had to see to it. 
I've heard different ones tell time and time 
again that whenever he'd pardoned a sol- 
dier he couldn't rest till he'd get word 
back that 'twas all right. Did you ever 
hear about that Vermont boy in McClel- 
lan's army, sentenced to be shot along at 
10 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
the start for sleepin' on his post. 'Twas 
when they was camped over in Virginia 
right near Washington. Mr, Lincoln 
didn't know about it till late and when he 
heard the story he telegraphed down not 
to do it. Then he telegraphed askin' if 
they'd got his orders and when he didn't 
get an answer what does he do but get in 
his carriage and drive himself ten miles to 
camp to see that they didn't do it. Now 
that's what I call bein' a real president. 
That's executin'. 

Well, as I was savin', he understood 
the importance of a lot of things them 
young officers and some of the old ones 
didn't see at all, and he knew where to get 
the truth about 'em — went right to the sol- 
diers for it. They was just like the folks 
he was used to, and Mr. Lincoln was the 
greatest hand for folks — just plain com- 
mon folks — you ever see. He liked 'em, 
11 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
never forgot 'em, just natural nice to 



'em. 



It used to rile old Judge Davis a lot 
when they was travelin' the circuit, the way 
Mr. Lincoln never made no difference be- 
tween lawyers and common folks. I heard 
Judge Logan tellin' in here one day about 
their all bein' in the tavern up to Bloom- 
ington one day. In those times there was 
just one big table for everybody. The 
lawyers and big bugs always set at one 
end and the teamsters and farmers at the 
other. Mr. Lincoln used to like to get 
down among the workin' folks and get the 
news. Reckon he got kinda tired hearin' 
discussin' goin' on all the time. Liked to 
hear about the crops and politics and folks 
he knew. 

This time he was down among 'em, and 
Judge Davis, who always wanted Lincoln 
right under his nose, calls out: " Come up 
12 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
here, Mr. Lincoln; here's where you be- 
long." And Mr. Lincoln, he looked kinda 
funny at the Judge and he says: 

" Got anything better to eat up there, 
Judge? " And everybody tee-heed. 

Feelin' as he did about folks I could 
see how it would go ag'in the grain for 
the boys in the army to have a harder time 
than was necessary. He'd argue that they 
was doin' the flghtin' and ought to have 
the care. He'd feel a good deal worse 
about their bein' neglected than he would 
about the things he knew beforehand he 
had to stand, like woundin' and killin'. 
And 'twas just that way so I found out 
the time I was down to Washington visit- 
in' him. 

I told you, didn't I, how I went up to 
the Soldiers' Home and how we walked 
out that night and sat and talked till al- 
most mornin'? 'Twas a clear night with 
13 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
lots of stars and Washington looked 
mighty pretty lyin' there still and white. 
Mr. Lincoln pointed out the Capitol and 
the White House and Arlington and the 
Long Bridge, showin' me the lay of the 
land. 

" And it's nuthin' but one big hospital, 
Billy," he said after a while. " You 
wouldn't think, would you, lookin' down 
on it so peaceful and quiet, that there's 
50,000 sick and wounded soldiers there? 
Only Almighty God knows how many of 
'em are dyin' this minute; only Almighty 
God knows . how many are sufferin' so 
they're prayin' to die. They are comin' 
to us every day now — have been ever since 
the Wilderness, 50,000 here and 150,000 
scattered over the country. There's a 
crawlin' line of sick and wounded all the 
way from here to Petersburg to-night. 
There's a line from Georgia to Chatta- 
14 




And It's Nuthin' But One Big Hospital, Billy" 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
nooga — Sherman's men. You can't put 
your finger on a spot in the whole North 
that ain't got a crippled or fever-struck 
soldier in it. There were days in May, 
just after the Wilderness, when Mary and 
I used to drive the carriage along lines of 
ambulances which stretched from the 
docks to the hospitals, one, two miles. 
It was a thing to tear your heart out to 
see them. They brought them from the 
field just as they picked them up, with 
horrible, gaping, undressed wounds, blood 
and dust and powder caked over them — 
eaten by flies and mosquitoes. They'd 
been piled like cord wood on flat cars and 
transports. Sometimes they didn't get a 
drink until they were distributed here. 
Often when it was cold they had no blan- 
ket, when it was hot they had no shade. 
That w T as nearly four months ago, and 
still they come. Night after night as I 
15 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
drive up here from the White House I 
pass twenty, thirty, forty ambulances in 
a row distributin' the wounded and sick 
from Grant's army. 

" Think what it means! It means that 
boys like you and me were, not so long 
ago, have stood up and shot each other 
down — have trampled over each other and 
have left each other wounded and bleed- 
ing on the ground, in the rain or the heat, 
nobody to give 'em a drink or to say a 
kind word. Nothing but darkness and 
blood and groans and torture. Some- 
times I can't believe it's true. Boys from 
Illinois where I live, shootin' boys from 
Kentucky where I was born! It's only 
when I see them comin' in I realize it — 
boat load after boat load, wagon load 
after wagon load. It seemed sometimes 
after Bull Run and Fredericksburg and 
Chancellorsville if they didn't stop unload- 
16 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
in' 'em I'd go plumb crazy. But still they 
come, and only God knows when they'll 
stop. They say hell's like war, Billy. If 
'tis, — I'm glad I ain't Satan." 

Of course I tried to cheer him up. I'd 
been around visitin' the Illinois boys in 
the hospitals that day and I just lit in and 
told him how comfortable I'd found 'em 
and how chipper most of them seemed. 
" You'd think 'twas fun to be in the hos- 
pital to see some of 'em, Mr. Lincoln," 
I said. " What do you suppose old Tom 
Blodgett was doin'? Settin' up darnin' 
his socks. Yes, sir, insisted on doin' it 
himself. Said them socks had fit all the 
way from Washington to Richmond. 
They'd stood by him and he was goin' to 
stand by them. Goin' to dress their 
wounds as good as the doctor had his. 
Never saw anything so funny as that big 
feller propped up there tryin' to darn like 
17 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
he'd seen his mother do and all the time 
makin' fun. All the boys around were 
laffin' at him — called him the sock doctor. 

" And things were so clean and white 
and pretty and the women were runnin' 
around just like home." 

" God bless 'em," he said. " I don't 
know what we'd 'a' done if it hadn't been 
for the way the women have taken hold. 
Come down here willin' to do anything; 
women that never saw a cut finger before, 
will stand over a wound so terrible men 
will faint at the sight of it. I've known 
of women spendin' whole nights on a bat- 
tlefield huntin' for somebody they'd lost 
and stoppin' as they went to give water 
and take messages. I've known 'em to 
work steady for three days and nights 
without a wink of sleep down at the front 
after a battle, takin' care of the wounded. 
Here in Washington you can't stop 'em 
18 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
as long as they can see a tiling to be done. 
At home they're supportin' the families 
and workin' day and night to help us. 
They give their husbands and their boys 
and then themselves. God bless the wo- 
men, Billy. We can't save the Union 
without 'em. 

" It makes a difference to the boys in a 
hospital havin' 'em. People don't real- 
ize how young this army is. Half the 
wounded here in Washington to-day are 
children — not twenty yet — lots of 'em 
under eighteen. Children who never went 
to sleep in their lives before they went 
into the army without kissin' their mothers 
good-night. You take such a boy as that 
and let him lie in camp a few months 
gettin' more and more tired of it and he 
gets homesick — plain homesick — he wants 
his mother. Perhaps he don't know 
what's the matter and he wouldn't admit 
19 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
it if he did. First thing you know he's 
in the hospital with camp fever, or he gets 
wounded. I tell you a woman looks good 
to him. 

" It's a queer thing to say, Billy, but I 
get real comfort out of the hospitals. 
When you know what the wounded have 
been through — how they have laid on the 
battlefields for hours and hours uncared 
for, how they've suffered bein' hauled up 
here, there ain't nuthin' consoles you like 
knowin' that their wounds have been 
dressed and that they are clean and fed, 
and looked after. Then they are so thank- 
ful to be here — to have some one to see to 
'em. I remember one day a boy who had 
been all shot up but was gettin' better 
sayin' to me : ' Mr. Lincoln, I can't sleep 
nights thinkin' how comfortable I am.' 
It's so good to find 'em realizin' that 
everybody cares — the whole country. 
20 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
People come and read to 'em and write 
letters for 'em and bring 'em tilings. 
Why, they have real good times at some 
of the places. Down to Armory Square 
Bliss has got a melodeon and they have 
concerts sometimes, and there are flags 
up and flowers in the windows. I got 
some flower seeds last summer for Bliss 
to plant outside, but they turned out to 
be lettuce and onions. The boys ate 'em 
and you ought to heard 'em laugh about 
my flowers. I tell you it makes me happy 
when I go around and find the poor fel- 
lows smilin' up at me and sayin' : ' You're 
takin' good care of us, Mr. Lincoln,' and 
maybe crack a joke. 

" They take it all so natural, trampin' 
and fightin' and dyin'. It's a wonderful 
army — wonderful! You couldn't believe 
that boys that back home didn't ever have 
a serious thought in their heads could ever 
21 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
be so dead set as they be about an idee. 
Think of it! A million men are lookin' 
up at these stars to-night, a million men 
ready to die for the Union to-morrow if 
it's got to be done to save it! I tell you, 
it shows what's in 'em. They're all the 
same, young or old — the Union's got to 
be saved ! Of course you'd expect it more 
of the old ones, and we've got some old 
ones, older than the law allows, too. 
'Tain't only the youngsters who have lied 
themselves into the service. Only to-day 
a Congressman was in tellin' me about 
one of his constituents, said he was over 
sixty-five and white-haired when he first 
enlisted. They refused him of course, 
and I'll be blamed if the old fellow didn't 
dye his hair black and change his name, 
and when they asked him his age, said: 
' Rising thirty-five,' and he's been fightin' 
good for two years and now they'd found 
22 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
him out. The Congressman asked me 
what he ought to do. I told him if 'twas 
me I'd keep him in hair dye." 

We was still a while and then Mr. Lin- 
coln began talkin', more to himself than to 
me. 

" A million men, a mighty host — and 
one word of mine would bring the million 
sleeping boys to their feet — send them 
without a word to their guns — they would 
fall in rank — regiment on regiment, bri- 
gade on brigade, corps on corps, a word 
more and they would march steady, quiet, 
a million men in step straight ahead, over 
fields, through forests, across rivers. 
Nothing could stop them — cannons might 
tear holes in their ranks, and they would 
fill them up, a half million might be bled 
out of them, and a word of mine would 
bring a half million more to fill their place. 
23 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
Oh, God, my God," he groaned, under his 
breath, " what am I that Thou shouldst 
ask this of me! What am I that Thou 
shouldst trust me so! " 

Well, I just dropped my head in my 
hands — seemed as if I oughten to look at 
him — and the next tiling I knew Mr. Lin- 
coln's arm was over my shoulder and he 
was saying in that smilin' kind of voice he 
had: " Don't mind me, Billy. The Lord 
generally knows what He's about and He 
can get rid of me quick enough if He sees 
I ain't doin' the job — quicker than the 
Copperheads can." 

Just like him to change so. Didn't 
want anybody to feel bad. But I never 
forgot that, and many a time in my sleep 
I've heard Abraham Lincoln's voice cry- 
ing out: " Oh, God, my God, what am I 
that Thou shouldst ask this of me! " and 
I've groaned to think how often through 
24 




"What Am I That Thou Shouldst Ask This of Me 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
them four awful years he must have lifted 
up his face with that look on it and asked 
the Lord what in the world he was doing 
that thing for. 

" After all, Billy," he went on, " it's 
surprisin' what a happy army it is. In 
spite of bein' so dead in earnest and havin' 
so much trouble of one kind and another, 
seems sometimes as if you couldn't put 
'em anywhere that they wouldn't scare up 
some fun. Greatest chaps to sing on the 
march, to cut up capers and play tricks 
you ever saw. I reckon the army's a little 
like me, it couldn't do its job if it didn't 
get a good laugh now and then — sort o' 
clears up the air when tilings are lookin' 
blue. Anyhow the boys are always get- 
tin' themselves into trouble by their 
pranks. Jokin' fills the guard-house as 
often as drunkenness or laziness. That 
and their bein' so sassy. A lot of 'em 
25 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
think they know just as much as the offi- 
cers do, and I reckon they're right pretty 
often. It takes some time to learn that 
it ain't good for the service for them to 
be speakin' their minds too free. At the 
start they did it pretty often — do now 
sometimes. Why, only just this week 
Stanton told me about a sergeant, who 
one day when the commanding officer 
was relieving his mind by swearing at 
his men, stepped right out of the ranks 
and reproved him and said he was break- 
ing the law of God. Well, they clapped 
him in the guard-house and now they 
want to punish him harder — say he ain't 
penitent — keeps disturbin' the guard- 
house by prayin' at the top of his voice 
for that officer. I told Stanton we better 
not interfere, that there wasn't nothing 
in the regulations against a man's prayin' 
for his officers. 

26 




Don't Mind Me, Billy, The Lord Generally Knows 
What He's About" 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
" Yes, it's a funny army. There don't 
seem to be but one thing that discourages 
it, and that's not fightin'. Keep 'em still 
in camp where you'd think they'd be com- 
fortable and they go to pieces every time. 
It's when they're lyin' still we have the 
worst camp fever and the most deserters. 
Keep 'em on the move, let 'em think 
they're goin' to have a fight and they perk 
up right off. 

" We can't fail with men like that. 
Make all the mistakes we can, they'll 
make up for 'em. The hope of this war is 
in the common soldiers, not in the generals 
— not in the War Department, not in me. 
It's in the boys. Sometimes it seems to 
me that nobody sees it quite right. It's in 
war as it is in life — a whole raft of men 
work day and night and sweat and die to 
get in the crops and mine the ore and 
build the towns and sail the seas. They 
27 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
make the wealth but they get mighty little 
of it. We ain't got our values of men's 
work figured out right yet — the value of 
the man that gives orders and of the man 
that takes 'em. I hear people talkin' as if 
the history of a battle was what the gen- 
erals did. I can't help thinkin' that the 
history of this war is in the knapsack of 
the common soldier. He's makin' that 
history just like the farmers are makin' 
the wealth. We fellows at the top are 
only usin' what they make. 

"At, any rate that's the way I see it, 
and I've tried hard ever since I've been 
down here to do all I could for the boys. 
I know lots of officers think I peek 
around camp too much, think 'tain't good 
for discipline. But I've always felt I 
ought to know how they was livin' and 
there didn't seem to be no other sure way 
of flndin' out. Officers ain't always good 
28 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
housekeepers, and I kinda felt I'd got to 
keep my eye on the cupboard. 

" I reckon Stanton thinks I've inter- 
fered too much, but there's been more'n 
enough trouble to go around in this war, 
and the only hope was helpin' where you 
could. But 'tain't much one can do. I 
can no more help every soldier that comes 
to me in trouble than I can dip all the 
water out of the Potomac with a teaspoon. 

" Then there's that pardoning business. 
Every now and then I have to fix it up 
with Stanton or some officer for pardon- 
ing so many boys. I suppose it's pretty 
hard for them not to have all their rules 
lived up to. They've worked out a lot of 
laws to govern this army, and I s'pose 
it's natural enough for 'em to think the 
most important thing in the world is 
havin' 'em obeyed. They've got it fixed 
so the boys do everything accordin' to 
29 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
regulations. They won't even let 'em die 
of something that ain't on the list — 
got to die accordin' to the regulations. 
But by jingo, Billy, I ain't goin' to have 
boys shot accordin' to no dumb regula- 
tions! I ain't goin' to have a butcher's 
day every Friday in the army if I can 
help it. It's so what they say about me, 
that I'm always lookin' for an excuse to 
pardon somebody. I do it every time I 
can find a reason. When they're young 
and when they're green or when they've 
been worked on by Copperheads or when 
they've got disgusted lyin' still and come 
to think we ain't doin' our job — when I 
see that I ain't goin' to have 'em shot. 
And then there's my leg cases. I've got a 
drawerful. They make Holt maddest — 
says he ain't any use for cowards. Well, 
generally speakin' I ain't, but I ain't 
sure what I'd do if I was standin' in front 
30 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
of a gun, and more'n that as I told Holt 
if Almighty God gives a man a cow- 
ardly pair of legs how can he help 
their running away with him? 

" You can't make me believe it's good 
policy to shoot these soldiers, anyhow. 
Seems to me one thing we've never taken 
into account as we ought to is that this is 
a volunteer army. These men came down 
here to put an end to this rebellion and 
not to get trained as soldiers. They just 
dropped the work they was doin' right 
where it was — never stopped to fix up 
things to be away long. Why, we've got a 
little minister at the head of one company 
that was preachin' when he heard the news 
of Bull Run. He shut up his Bible, told 
the congregation what had happened, and 
said: ' Brethren, I reckon it's time for us 
to adjourn this meetin' and go home and 
drill,' and they did it, and now they're 
31 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
down with Grant. When the war's over 
that man will go back and finish that 
sermon. 

" That's the way with most of 'em. 
You can't treat such an army like you 
would one that had been brought up to 
soljerin' as a business. They'll take dis- 
cipline enough to fight, but they don't 
take any stock in it as a means of earnin' 
a livin'. 

" More'n that they've got their own 
ideas about politics and military tactics 
and mighty clear ideas about all of us that 
are runnin' things. You can't fool 'em on 
an officer. They know when one ain't fit 
to command, and time and time again 
they've pestered a coward or a braggart 
or a bully out of the service. An officer 
who does his job best he can, even if he 
ain't very smart, just honest and faithful, 
they'll stand by and help. If he's a big 
32 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
one, a real big man, they can't do enough 
for him. Take the way they feel about 
Thomas, the store they set by him. I 
met a boy on crutches out by the White 
House the other day and asked him where 
he got wounded. He told me about the 
place they held. ' Pretty hot, wasn't it ? ' 
I said. ' Yes, but Old Pap put us there 
and he wouldn't 'a' done it if he hadn't 
known we could 'a' held it.' No more 
question ' Old Pap ' than they would God 
Almighty. But if it had been some gen- 
erals they'd skedaddled. 

" They ain't never made any mistake 
about me just because I'm president. A 
while after Bull Run I met a boy out on 
the street here on crutches, thin and white, 
and I stopped to ask him about how he 
got hurt. Well, Billy, he looked at me 
hard as nails, and he says : ' Be you Abe 
Lincoln?' And I said, ' Yes.' 'Well,' 
33 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
he says, ' all I've got to say is you don't 
know your job. I enlisted glad enough to 
do my part and I've done it, but you ain't 
done yourn. You promised to feed me, 
and I marched three days at the begin- 
ning of these troubles without anything to 
eat but hardtack and two chunks of salt 
pork — no bread, no coffee — and what I 
did get wasn't regular. They got us up 
one mornin' and marched us ten miles 
without breakfast. Do you call that pro- 
vidin' for an army? And they sent us 
down to fight the Rebs at Bull Run, and 
when we was doin' our best and holdin' 
'em — I tell you, holdin' 'em — they told us 
to fall back. I swore I wouldn't — I 
hadn't come down there for that. They 
made me — rode me down. I got struck 
— struck in the back. Struck in the back 
and they left me there — never came for 
me, never gave me a drink and I dyin' of 
34 




Be You Abe Lincoln ? " 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
thirst. I crawled five miles for water, and 
I'd be dead and rottin' in Virginia to-day 
if a teamster hadn't picked me up and 
brought me to this town and found an old 
darkey to take care of me. You ain't 
doin' your job, Abe Lincoln; you won't 
win this war until you learn to take care 
of the soldiers.' 

" I couldn't say a thing. It was true. 
It's been true all the time. It's true to- 
day. We ain't takin' care of the soldiers 
like we ought. 

" You don't suppose such men are goin' 
to accept the best lot of regulations ever 
made without askin' questions? Not a 
bit of it. They know when things are 
right and when they're not. When they 
see a man who they know is nothing but 
a boy or one they know's bein' eat up with 
homesickness or one whose term is out, 
and ought to be let go, throwing every- 
35 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
thing over and deserting it don't make 
them any better soldiers to have us shoot 
him. Makes 'em worse in my judgment, 
makes 'em think we don't understand. 
Anyhow, discipline or no discipline, I 
ain't goin' to have any more of it than I 
can help. It ain't good common sense. 

" You can't run this army altogether as 
if 'twas a machine. It ain't. It's a peo- 
ple's army. It offered itself. It has 
come down here to fight this thing out — 
just as it would go to the polls. It is 
greater than its generals, greater than the 
administration. We are created to care 
for it and lead it. It is not created for 
us. Every day the war has lasted I've 
felt this army growin' in power and deter- 
mination. I've felt its hand on me, guid- 
ing, compelling, threatening, upholding 
me, felt its distrust and its trust, its blame 
and its love. I've felt its patience and its 
36 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
sympathy. The greatest comfort I get is 
when sometimes I feel as if mebbe the 
army understood what I was tryin' to do 
whether Greeley did or not. They under- 
stood because it's their war. Why, we 
might fail, every one of us, and this war 
would go on. The army would find 
its leaders like they say the old Roman 
armies sometimes did and would finish 
the fight. 

" I tell you, Billy, there ain't nuthin' 
that's ever happened in the world so far 
as I know that gives one such faith in the 
people as this army and the way it acts. 
There's been times, I ain't denyin', when 
I didn't know but the war was goin' to be 
too much for us, times when I thought 
that mebbe a republic like this couldn't 
stand such a strain. It's the kind of gov- 
ernment we've got that's bein' tested in 
this war, government by the people, and 
37 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
it's the People's Army that makes me cer- 
tain it can't be upset." 

I tell you it done me good to see him 
settin' up straight there talkin' so proud 
and confident, and as I was watchin' him 
there popped into my head some words 
from a song I'd heard the soldiers sing: 

We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred 

thousand more — 
From Mississippi's winding stream and from New 

England's shore. 

You have called us and we're coming. By Rich- 
mond's bloody tide 

To lay us down, for Freedom's sake, our brothers' 
bones beside; 

Six hundred thousand loyal men and true have 

gone before — 
We are coming, Father Abraham, three hundred 

thousand more. 

38 



FATHER ABRAHAM 
That was it. That was what he was, 
the Father of the Army, Father Abra- 
ham, and somehow the soldiers had found 
it out. Curious how a lot of people who 
never see a man in their lives will come to 
understand him exact. 



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